(Fakkir Mohamed Ibrahim Kalifulla and Abhay Manohar Sapre, JJ.)
Pradeep Kumar _________________________ Appellant
v.
State of Himachal Pradesh _________________ Respondent
Criminal Appeal No. 213 of 2015, decided on February 3, 2015
[Arising out of SLP (Crl.) No. 3961/2014]
The Judgement of the court was delivered by
Abhay Manohar Sapre, J.
1. Leave granted.
2. This Criminal Appeal is filed by the accused against the judgment and order dated 29.10.2013 passed by the High Court of Himachal Pradesh at Shimla in Criminal Appeal No. 154 of 2008 which arises out of judgment and order dated 26.03.2008 passed by the Additional Sessions Judge, Fast Track Court, Shimla in S. Trial No. 8-R/7 of 2008/07.
3. By impugned judgment, the High Court dismissed two connected criminal appeals – one filed by the present appellant being Criminal Appeal No. 154 of 2008 and the other filed by two accused persons being Criminal Appeal No. 211 of 2008 against their conviction under Section 302 read with Section 34 and Section 201 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (hereinafter referred to as “IPC”).
4. So far as the present appellant is concerned, he was convicted by the Sessions Judge only for the offence punishable under Section 201 IPC and was, accordingly, sentenced to undergo 5 years’ RI with a fine of Rs. 10,000/-. His appeal filed against the conviction and sentence was dismissed by the High Court by the impugned judgment, giving rise to filing of this appeal.
5. The short question which arises for consideration in this appeal is whether the Courts below were justified in convicting the appellant for an offence punishable under Section 201 IPC and were, therefore, justified in sentencing him to undergo 5 years’ RI for commission of such offence.
6. The facts of the case for the disposal of this appeal lie in a narrow compass. They, however, need mention in brief to appreciate the grievance of the appellant.
7. On 10.9.2006, Puranchand (PW-1) and his brother Gopichand (PW-2) lodged a complaint in Police Station Chirgaon. As per the complaint, Puranchand’s daughter-Reeta Kumari who was married to Deep Ram (one of the accused) about 5 years back and had a minor daughter of one year born out of the wed lock was missing. It was stated that Deep Ram was living with his family with his sister Suban Dei in village-Shounter and visited Puranchand’s house on 05.09.2006. Puranchand inquired as to why he came alone and did not bring Reetakumari. On this, Deep Ram said that he had gone to attend some fair and from there he came alone. After Deep Ram left, Puranchand not being satisfied with his answer asked his wife Gianpati to go to the house of Deep Ram to find out the well being of their daughter. Gianpati accordingly went to Deep Ram’s house and came to know that her daughter (Reeta kumari) was missing from 04.09.2006 from the house. Puranchand then started doubting and made frantic efforts to search for his daughter but all were in vain. He then suspected that Deep Ram must have killed her daughter.
8. On 10.09.2006, police received a message from one Sunil Kumar Pradhan Gram Panchayat – Sari (Gaonsari) that one dead body was lying in Gaonsari Kufshala-Thach. On receiving the message, the police reached the spot and found a verification that the dead body was of Reeta Kumari.
9. This led to further investigation resulting in apprehending Deep Ram – husband of Reeta Kumari (deceased), Pradeep Kumar (appellant) – real brother of Deep Ram and Neeraj Kumar (another accused) – servant of Deep Ram for commission of offence of murder of Reeta Kumari. After completing all the formalities such as custodial interrogation of the accused, recording of statement of several witnesses, seizing of articles from the spot and the places disclosed by the accused/witnesses in their disclosure statements, post-mortem of the dead body, and preparation of spot map etc., the police submitted a charge-sheet against the aforementioned 3 accused persons for commission of offences punishable under Section 302 read with Section 201 and 34 of IPC. The case was then committed to the Sessions Court for trial.
10. As mentioned above, so far as accused-Deep Ram and Neeraj Kumar are concerned, both were convicted for an offence punishable under Section 302 read with Section 34 IPC and sentenced to undergo imprisonment for life with a fine of Rs. 20,000/- each with default clause. So far as the appellant-Pradeep Kumar is concerned, he was convicted for an offence punishable under Section 201 IPC and sentenced to undergo 5 years’ RI with a fine of Rs. 10,000/- with default clause. All the three accused filed appeals against their conviction and sentence in the High Court. The High Court dismissed their appeals and confirmed their conviction and sentence. Questioning the legality and correctness of his conviction and sentence, Pradeep Kumar alone has filed this appeal by way of special leave.
11. Learned Counsel for the appellant while assailing the legality and the correctness of the impugned judgment contended that there was no evidence whatsoever against the appellant to implicate him in commission of offence punishable under Section 201 IPC. Learned Counsel urged that only because the appellant happened to be the real brother of Deep Ram, by itself should not have been made a ground to implicate him in commission of the offence. Learned Counsel pointed out that the appellant was not living in the area where Deep Ram was staying and nor was he aware of the commission of offence by other two accused, hence, only on the basis of some disclosure statement made at the instance of the appellant which led to recovery of certain articles used in commission of offence, it was not safe to hold the appellant guilty of offence punishable under Section 201 IPC. Lastly, learned Counsel argued that having regard to the nature of offence and other relevant factors brought out on record in evidence, the sentence of 5 years awarded to the appellant is on higher side and should be reduced.
12. In reply, learned Counsel for the State urged for upholding of the impugned order and contended that no case is made out to call for any interference in the finding of the courts below. According to him, the Courts below have taken note of all the relevant aspects of the case and then rightly held the appellant guilty of the offence punishable under Section 201 IPC. He, therefore, prayed for dismissal of appeal.
13. Having heard the learned counsel for the parties and on perusal of the record of the case, we are inclined to uphold the conviction of the appellant, finding no fault therein, but interfere only with the quantum of punishment and reduced it to 2 years instead of 5 years.
14. Coming to the question of complicity of the appellant in commission of the offence under Section 201 IPC, we find no good ground to differ with the concurrent findings of the courts below which rightly held the appellant guilty for committing the offence in question. It is not in dispute that the appellant was the real brother of main accused Deep Ram-husband of the deceased. It is also not in dispute that their relations with each other were not strained. In other words, they were cordial. It is also not in dispute that on the strength of disclosure statement made by the appellant (Ex-PW-17/K), “rope” used in commission of offence (Ex-P-17/L) was recovered. That apart, the appellant was spotted along with main accused in forest by Vidyanand (PW-5). This, in our opinion, was sufficient to implicate the appellant in commission of the offence in question and hence we find no good ground to discard this evidence for acquitting the appellant of the offence punishable under Section 201 IPC.
15. Coming now to the question of sentence, we have given our anxious consideration to this question. In our considered view, having regard to relevant facts and circumstances appearing in the case, as brought out by the learned counsel for the appellant in his submission and further taking into consideration the appellant’s age and family background, we consider it appropriate to modify the sentence awarded by the courts below and accordingly reduce it to 2 years RI instead of 5 years RI. The interference is called for only to this extent.
16. In the light of foregoing discussion, the appeal succeeds and is allowed in part. The sentence awarded to the appellant is modified to the extent indicated above. So far as the fine amount awarded by the Courts below is concerned, it is upheld.
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